Worlds Apart Book Three: Boadicea Copyright © 2003, 2018 James G. Wittenbach All rights reserved. www.worldsapartbooks.com Produceed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Wittenbach, James Worlds Apart Book 03: Boadicea I. Title ISBN 0- 0-9763384-0-8 Copyright © 2003, 2012. James G. Wittenbach. All rights reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter One ........................................................................ 1 Chapter Two ...................................................................... 17 Chapter Three ................................................................... 35 Chapter Four ..................................................................... 52 Chapter Five ...................................................................... 68 Chapter Six ........................................................................ 86 Chapter Seven ................................................................. 106 Chapter Eight .................................................................. 124 Chapter Nine ................................................................... 147 Chapter Ten ..................................................................... 171 Chapter Eleven ................................................................ 192 Chapter Twelve ............................................................... 213 Chapter Thirteen ............................................................. 237 Chapter Fourteen ............................................................ 256 Chapter Fifteen ............................................................... 272 Chapter Sixteen ............................................................... 290 Chapter Seventeen .......................................................... 314 Chapter Eighteen ............................................................ 330 Chapter Nineteen ........................................................... 348 Chapter Twenty .............................................................. 366 Chapter Twenty-One ..................................................... 383 Chapter Twenty-Two ..................................................... 394 Chapter Twenty-Three ................................................... 405 Chapter Twenty-Four .................................................... 429 Coda ................................................................................. 467 Copyright © 2003, 2012. James G. Wittenbach. All rights reserved. WORLDS APART: BOOK 03: BOADICEA CHAPTER ONE Despite certain reckless metaphors, space is not a final frontier. It is, in fact, no frontier it all. A frontier, by Page | 1 definition, is a boundary, a margin between the known and the unknown. Space, by definition, is nothing at all. Space is the absence of things, and the space between stars is empty beyond wanting, vast beyond measurement, and unknowable except to The Allbeing. The average density of matter in interstellar space, for the most part, is something like one hydrogen atom for every thousand cubic meters. In star systems, where planets, comets, and other miscellaneous rocks are most populous, the average density is only marginally greater. Galaxies might collide and pass through one another without a single collision between stars or planets or even specks of dust, there being so much more space than things for space to be between. Save for a few anomalous sprinkles of matter adrift in the cosmic winds, the universe is a boundless vacancy, an immensity of nothingness beyond human contemplation. So, when the starburst pattern appears in one Empty Quarter of the cosmos, heralding the emergence of one of humanity's great pathfinder ships, what exactly is being moved aside? If there is nothing there, then what structure must be warped and parted to allow the massive ship to depart the anarchic dimensions of hyperspace and re-enter the orderly universe of stars, gravity, humans, and the Fathomless Void? WORLDS APART: BOOK 03: BOADICEA A physicist and a philosopher would give the same answer, what Pegasus moves aside is whatever it is that holds the nothingness together. Page | 2 Pegaus – Main Bridge/Primary Command “...point-four-oh light days from the outer margin of system 12 822 Equuleus.” Lieutenant Navigator Eliza Jane Change reported as some of the interface gear peeled from her face and arms, revealing a smooth-skinned woman with straight black hair and hard-edged beauty. The engineers and theoreticians who designed the navigation systems for the Pathfinder ships predicted they would emerge 30 to 90 light days outside a system 90% of the time. She had beaten them three for three now, but to betray pride would have been a breach in the aura of seriousness she wore like armor. “Well done, Change,” said Pegasus's Commanding Officer, Prime Commander William Keeler, a hearty fellow, whose bearing reflected a life of accustomed privilege and the routine satisfaction of appetites, both intellectual and gustatory. One of his hands was still bandaged from their last exploratory mission, to the very bizarre and dysfunctional world called Eden. In the course of his visit to the renowned hospitality planet, he had been attacked by winged guardsmen, ferocious beasts, vampires, and, worst of all, a breed of vile creature that had been driven to extinction on his own world millennia before ... politicians. In the Captain's good hand, he held his trademark ancient walking stick; a long thick pole of some strange WORLDS APART: BOOK 03: BOADICEA alien material, covered with mysterious alien runes. As a weapon, the stick had served him well on that world. The crew had had their doubts about Keeler when he had been given command of their ship only a few days before Page | 3 launch. They had known only that he had been the chancellor and professor of history at the University of Sapphire at New Cleveland, that he was a Keeler who could trace his ancestry to the founding of the colony, and that he had turned down a place in the crew earlier when he had been passed over for command. He looked the part of the sinecured academic, large, almost middle-aged (a few wisps of gray at the temples), his gray eyes sparkled with intelligence. Two missions under his leadership had proven him to be more than any of them had expected. The slim figure of Executive Commander Goneril Lear stood in the forebridge of Primary Command (PC-1). To the crew, she was more Keeler's rival than First Officer, and the direction of the ship was a constant battle of wills between the laid-back professor from Sapphire and the hard-charging Ministry bureaucrat from Republic. “Initial scans indicate we are 8.3 degrees off the plane of the system,” she reported crisply. “If the University of Sapphire at New Cleveland Navigational Reconstruction team have come through for us again, we should find the ancient Commonwealth colony of Medea here.” “They haven't let us down yet,” Keeler said, confidently. He looked up to his trim, officious first officer, and wondered what machinations were in progress behind those gray eyes he could not imagine, nor did he want to. WORLDS APART: BOOK 03: BOADICEA “Shall I begin preparing the Surveyor probes?” Lear asked. “Say pretty please,” said the captain, and he waited for her response although he knew she never would. He Page | 4 turned back to his navigator. “Lt Change, lay in a course for the inner system. Commander Lear, you may prepare your probes.” Keeler had done some research, while in hyperspace transit, on the origin of the name “Medea.” Medea was a mytho-historical figure of ancient Earth; a witch married to a powerful, charismatic, and deeply corrupt monarch, whom she had brought to power through her witchcraft. When the Monarch had carnal relations with a chubby courtesan, Medea had her killed, but the Monarch was blamed for the crime. Challenged by the Court to account for some of his evil activities, the King explained that as horrible as his crimes were, letting his enemies come to power would be worse. Medea bewitched his court into agreeing with him and the Monarch was absolved. Eventually, the Monarch grew old and it was his time to leave. The Monarch's chosen successor prepared to replace him, but the Monarch’s enemies usurped him. Medea and the Monarch fled in a chariot, drawn by winged dragons, pursued by their enemies. In order to delay the pursuit, Medea killed her two daughters and cut the bodies into pieces, scattering the parts behind them. The pursuers had to stop and collect the dismembered bodies in order to give them proper burial, and so Medea and the Former Monarch escaped. WORLDS APART: BOOK 03: BOADICEA Unable to remain away from power, Medea secured herself a place in the Imperial Senate. The monarch left her for another woman. Medea got revenge for the desertion by killing the new bride with a poisoned robe and tiara Page | 5 that burned the flesh from her body. The monarch died as well when he tried to embrace his dying bride. Ultimately, Medea became queen and brought ruin to her country. Keeler could not imagine why anyone would want to name a colony after such a figure, but who was he to judge? Pegasus – The UnderDecks: Fast Eddie’s Interstellar Slam- n-Jam At the moment of emergence, Tactical Commander Redfire was one hundred twenty one decks below the bridge, in what originally had been a tertiary auxiliary holding tank for contaminated water. It was being converted into a gathering place, where the crew might come to socialize, listen to bad music, eat worse